Cultural differences throughout the southwest have created major issues for many folks.

1. they are situated along lymph vessels – lymph passes through them, they are loaded with lymphocytes, and they may become swollen during an infection; bacteria arrives, gets caught, stimulates an immune response; their job is to filter lymph before it is returned to the venous system (99% of the antigens will be removed)

2. a pink gland that lies behind the sternum that is the site of t-cell production and maturation

3. largest collection of lymphatic tissue in the body; there are lots of b-cells/t-cells/macrophages (ameboids that phagocytose); it also filters the blood itself

4. they are WBCs that may live from 4-20 years; they stay in the lymphoid organs until they are needed; lymphoid stem cells in the marrow either: go to the thymus to mature and divide into T cells, are b cells in the bone that become plasma cells for the production of antibodies, or become NK cells in the bone (natural killers)

5. cytoxic (directly attack foreign body cells or cells attacked by viruses), helper (exposure to antigens), suppressor (suppresses responses of other T and B cells)

6. b cells (bone-marrow derived) can differentiate into plasma cells, the cells that are responsible for making antibody molecules in their membrane; if interstitial fluid contains antigens that will bind to the antibodies, then the b cells are sensitized (antibody-mediated immunity)

7. destroys abnormal cells – continuous monitoring of tissues (immunological surveillance)

8. lymphocyte production; it occurs in the bone marrow and the thymus; hemocytoblasts in the bone marrow produce lymphoid stem cells with two fates – either to stay in the bone and become B or NK cells, or to migrate to the thymus and become T cells